LifePO4 Battery Bank

Sounds like a very interesting product but wow!....205 bucks!

Also, could you please direct me to the place in the link you posted for this product or somewhere else on their web site where it actually says, "Manufacturer says will always stay powered on and can be recharged and used at the same time."?
 
Sounds like a very interesting product but wow!....205 bucks!

Also, could you please direct me to the place in the link you posted for this product or somewhere else on their web site where it actually says, "Manufacturer says will always stay powered on and can be recharged and used at the same time."?

was through email exchanges that I was told would always stay on. the celllink is 160 ish with less capacity I believe
 
no. figuring I would need to fully vet the product to see if it would actually work well

Unless they explain how the do the battery management, you would never know if it really works.

It seems like a really interesting product. Maybe they really did pass-through charging...but my feeling is that they should explain their approach. For some reason, the only company that actually ever came out and explained the technique they use to accomplish pass-through charging is Apple and what they do is shut off the charger and let the battery drain down a bit behind the scenes while showing 100% charge to the user who has his laptop, tablet or iPhone plugged in while using it. That way, they are not actually charging the battery at the same time it is discharging.
 
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Its designed for solar use so it has to be pass through.

DC Input is stated to be 15v 3A so it might not even charge in a car, and the 3A rate is rather slow. It will take about 4 hours to charge 10Ah from empty to full.

Cellink capacity is 6Ah with a 7A charge rate, which can basically charge from empty to full in about an hour.
 
Its designed for solar use so it has to be pass through.

It still might have a battery management scheme similar to what Apple does as well as other smartphone and tablet makers like Samsung. As I understand from what Apple has stated they don't actually do "pass-through" charging, per se, but instead allow the battery voltage to drop to a certain point, begin charging until fully charged, drop again and repeat.....all behind the scenes, hidden from the user who has the device in use and plugged in. This avoids stressing the battery cells by charging at the same time they are discharging and avoids confusing the charger circuit as the voltage hovers near the full charge cut-off point. Like I say, at least that's my understanding of how "pass through charging" is supposed to work. If the power source is solar it would be no different than mains.
 
That explanation is correct as far as I can find out (y) A slower charge rate is better for the batteries, but not always better for the user. The problem with powerbanks versus bespoke devices is that with one you can't know what power draw will be attached while you can with the other. That makes it easier for Apple etal, but harder for powerbank designers.

Powerbanks are designed to be a convenient, portable, 'plug-and-play' universal power source. While you can use them as a more permanent solution (like is being spoken of here) there are other options for this use worth considering. I'm going to have a dual-battery setup eventually, like RV's use, with a marine-type deep cycle battery added. An SLA or AGM battery could be used to equal effect. These can be charging while in use with the car running, and are probably a better solution for extremely long parking times or heavy power draws ;) Lithium batteries are generally quite safe when not abused, but these other methods are safer and are more tolerant of the higher heat levels encountered in some climates. Not as easy or as cheap to implement, but still an option worth considering if you plan to keep your vehicle for awhile and have space available to do it :cool:

Phil
 
Yes, it's true. Lower amperage charging will stress the battery cells less and give you longer service life. I use a one amp charger most of the time to charge my power banks but I have a 2 amp charger for when I need to charge faster. My oldest lithium-ion power bank is now three years and three months old and is still functioning perfectly with that charging scheme. I ran it continuously for just under six hours yesterday running two dash cams and at the end of the day it was still nearly fully charged. When I got home I left it to rest for a couple of hours and return to ambient room temperature. Then I left it charging overnight @1amp. Now it's good to go for today as it has been almost everyday for the last three years in all kinds of hot and cold conditions with a lot of vibration in the console of my truck on the dirt roads around here. This is a battery bank I paid 22 bucks for.

Like @SawMaster says, power banks and bespoke devices are different. Laptops, tablets and smartphone have built in sophisticated battery monitoring and management circuitry designed specifically for those devices. Standard power banks generally don't have such built in battery management schemes because that's not what they are designed for or how they are intended to be used and they cost far less than smartphones, laptops or tablets.

The Bioenno Power Pack being discussed here is more expensive and is also an inverter so it "may" have similar circuitry to laptops but they don't explain what they are doing or whether or not the device is specifically designed for charging while discharging a parasitic load. For me, now that I've been using several different modestly priced power banks with good results for three years I would not be inclined to go out and spend over 200 dollars on a power pack when I know I can spend one tenth the price for something just as serviceable.
 
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